So High, So Far Off The Ground

The latest craze sweeping me and seemingly all of my friends is Scrubs. I've watched the first three seasons now and have the fourth season all queued up for me. I really can't say how much I love the whole Bittorrent/Xbox Media Center setup that lets me catch up on all the shows I've missed. Grey's Anatomy season 1, the current season of Family Guy (I miss the new ones cause I work 16 hours every Sunday), the ABC miniseries Empire, and when you couple that setup with the TiVo I really can dictate what I want to watch whenever I want to watch it. I've gotten hella spoiled. Watching live TV is torture, all those commercials.

Work was interesting on Sunday. A 25-year-old drowned for what I think is the dumbest reason ever. Apparently the guy and his two friends were in a pool and decided to have a breath-holding contest. My only question is, what in the hell is wrong with the friends? How do you not notice your bud ISN'T COMING UP? How do you not freak the hell out, call 911, and get his ass out of the pool? A sad, stupid death. An unnecessary one. That's the kind of thing that makes me the most angry at work - when things happen that don't need to happen. Heart attacks, strokes - that kind of shit you can't prevent. They're gonna happen. But a diabetic who knowingly drinks 3 Mountain Dews and goes into a hyperglycemic shock? Or a drunk frat boy who tries to jump over a campfire and gets about 75% across? That stuff just makes you shake your head. You can't save them all, and it's frustrating as hell.

Two of the odder moments Sunday involved me escorting somebody to a mental health facility and me coming face to face with some illicit drugs. A woman came in with a self-inflicted throat laceration - she missed the major vessels and the airway, but left herself with one hideous gash across the throat. Because she was perceived to be a threat, the Behavioral Health Center (our off-site psychiatric ward) made the odd request of having a medic accompany security in the transport of the patient. I got tapped for the job because I was the most responsible, and conveniently I was also the strongest (she was a big lady). So we drove across the way to the psych center, and I escorted her through the halls. I'd never been to a mental health facility before, and it was a fairly interesting experience. Locks everywhere. It was quiet when I was there at 2am, but I could imagine the place being a fairly interesting place in the daylight hours.

The other odd moment came when I got begrudgingly stationed out at triage for the last hour or so of my shift. Two college aged males came in, one of them looked high as hell. His buddy fills out one of the sign-in forms and tells me "Dude, my friend ate some mushrooms and he isn't feeling well" to which I explain to him that's what's supposed to happen when you take drugs - you get messed up. He then reaches into his pocket and pulls out this big bag of mushrooms and slaps them on the desk in front of me. Now what in the hell are you supposed to do in a situation like that? When somebody just gives you drugs in a public place - what the hell? Why even bring them? I told the charge nurse who decided that TPD shouldn't be dragged out here for something so stupid, so I told the guys to just "lose them, flush them, get them out of my sight - I don't want to know where they are or where they went." But seriously, bringing the drugs with you? Why risk the chance that we get pissed off and call the cops? People are dumb.

I tried playing a few games of Cricket 2005 on my Xbox and proceeded to get the everliving shit kicked out of me. I was the Australian national team and I played a club team from Namibia, and after 10 overs of pitching was down 195-0 with 3 wickets gone. [For Americans who have no idea how that silly game is scored: I was getting my ass absolutely destroyed. I was the best team on the planet getting killed by scrubs. That's like the Yankees losing 15-0 to Central Michigan's college team. That's like the New England Patriots losing 65-0 in football to the Northwestern Wildcats.] I tried my hand then with Rugby 2005, and got similar results. I think I'll stick to baseball and football.

Speaking of football, I'm depressed. I need football. I fired up NCAA 06 on the Xbox and that first game - it made me feel empty. Walking into the stadium, hearing "The White and Gold" blaring, seeing the (pixellated) fans lining Bobby Dodd Stadium, watching the gold-domed players run onto the field - I miss football season. I also miss home games at Tech, waking up on Saturday mornings, getting all ready for the games. If I end up at Emory Med, you can bet your ass I'll be a season ticket holder (assuming I'm not on rotations or something).

I've started studying for the MCAT that I'm gonna take in April. After a practice test, it's clear that the biological sciences are my weak point - which is to be expected as I haven't had any organic chemistry yet. My MCAT schedule might get pushed back if I can't get the classes I need in the fall though, and that could really suck.

I live my life fairly free of regrets, but I do have two big ones. The first is letting myself get so unhealthy and out of shape, and I've been working on that. Eating better, actually exercising - I'm down about 30 pounds from what I weighed a year ago, but I didn't really try as hard as I have been lately. My goal is 250, so I've got a ways to go (currently I'm around 315).

The other big regret revolves around my inability to cope with a situation from three years ago, and my childish way of trying to cope - I lashed out. It's difficult when the two people you held most important in your life find a way to excise the need for your presence in the equation of things - when for so long you were the bridge between the two and they realized that you weren't necessary. If you missed it, a pretty big thing happened here the other day. A three year long silence was broken. A lot has changed in three years, and it's amazing the amount of growing-up I've done in that time period, but maybe I'm finally on the right path to mending one of the biggest regrets in my life. Sorry it took three years to finally act like a man and not a child.

This is long overdue:

Katy and Chris, I'm sorry.